By the time the Super League regular season reaches 27 rounds, the debate over individual brilliance usually becomes easier to frame. The real question is not who has had flashes of quality, but who has done enough across the season to force their way into the Leeds Rhinos players dream team conversation. On Sky Sports, Sam Tomkins and Jon Wilkin answered that question in very similar fashion — except for one very important spot.
Tomkins and Wilkin agreed on most of their selections ahead of Wigan Warriors’ home clash with Catalans Dragons at the Brick Community Stadium, but they split on the choice between Bevan French and Brodie Croft. That disagreement was the clearest sign that the official Super League Dream Team, which was imminent, was still going to leave room for argument even after a season that had produced a fairly strong group of contenders.
Tomkins explained his decision by pointing to Croft’s output and consistency, saying he felt there were a lot of similarities between the two picks but that Croft had done more over the course of the season. His case rested on volume as much as style: Croft’s 28 tries were part of what Tomkins described as his best personal season, and that kind of return is hard to ignore when a selector is weighing two elite playmakers.
Wilkin, though, went the other way. His argument was more about match-defining impact than raw totals. For him, Bevan French was not just a standout; he was the player who could swing the biggest moments and, in Wilkin’s words, help Wigan win the competition. He said French had been the best player in Super League since coming back in, and insisted that at this stage of the year he wanted that kind of influence in his team.
How the Dream Team selection is being judged
The official Super League Dream Team is being selected this year by the Man of Steel panel, journalists and supporters, so the final list is not just a reflection of one voting bloc or one broadcast debate. That matters because it explains why these pre-announcement choices are useful: they show how respected observers are separating strong seasons from truly defining ones.
Tomkins’ pick suggested a preference for the player who has delivered the clearest statistical case. Wilkin’s pick leaned toward the player whose presence changes how the opposition has to defend. Both positions make sense. Both are defensible. And that is exactly why the French-versus-Croft debate has become such a sharp divider in the buildup to the official Dream Team.
It also says something about the wider shape of the competition. End-of-season honours are rarely decided by reputation alone. They are decided by whether a player has been productive, decisive and hard to ignore over a long enough stretch to influence more than one game. In that sense, the split between Brodie Croft and Bevan French feels less like a disagreement over talent than a disagreement over value.
When the final Super League Dream Team is announced, the argument will not disappear. If anything, it will only sharpen it. That is usually the sign of a good selection debate: the best candidates are close enough that the difference comes down to what you prize most — output, influence or the ability to tilt the biggest matches.
